Comments

   So I know I've been asking you guys to leave me comments, and a few of you have left some interesting ones. As of yet I've failed to respond to any of them, and so I'd like to take this chance to follow up on the things you all have said. Here goes.

Mmmm Sugarcane

   Meg: The most interesting thing I ate here was sugarcane. Sugarcane is a hard, sweet plant that tastes sort of like watermelon and sort of like sweet corn (weird, I know). It is impossible to swallow, and it's kind of what I imagine eating sweet wood would be like. I had a few bites of this, realized that it isn't that good and is probably the worst food in the world for your teeth, and then never ate it again. The most interesting thing I drank was hot fermented milk. My unbiased opinion (formed in the moments before I realized what I was drinking) is that it tastes pretty good. It is sweet and creamy, and they put some combination of herbs in it that made it taste almost like chai tea. I admit that once I realized what I was drinking, I did not have any more. Another candidate is Ethiopian food, which we had yesterday. They serve different meats and vegetables on a flat sour pancake, and you pick up the food with pieces of this pancake that they serve on the side. Fairly spicy, very filling, and extremely delicious. Today we are going to a South Indian food place (in the U.S. and Britain they usually serve North Indian food). So we'll see how that goes. Most of the food here is plain, and consists mostly of stews, starches, and fruit. The stews are usually made with fish, chicken, or beef, and the meat is much gamier (leaner) here than in the U.S. They also serve a lot of French fries, greens, and ugali. Ugali is essentially a drier, stiffer version of grits.
    Jacob: We never found the Steeler's Super Bowl T-shirts, so I guess you can't even pretent like they won. Oh well. There are some industrial jobs to be had in Kenya, and probably fewer in Tanzania. One of our drivers had previously worked in a glue factory. He said it was not a good job because the safety standards are low. All the people we interviewed relied mainly on farming for their livelihood, with the exception of two or three teachers, who still received a large part of their income from farming. From what I gathered, almost all empolyment comes through the government, NGOs, tourism, fishing, casual labor, and farming. Many people in Northern Kenya are pastoralists (nomadic ranchers), and they have been hardest hit by the drought. They are harder for aid agencies to reach, and usually have even less emergency supplies saved up than farmers.
   The fact that food producers sometimes go hungry is a fascinating phenomenon, and one that I'd like to learn more about. One contributing factor that I failed to mention in the last post is the presence of businessmen who buy up much of the excess food at cutthroat rates and store it until prices rise again due to a shortage. This is not as much of a problem in the U.S. because the government takes measures to control prices. In some cases U.S. farmers will be paid not to maximize their food production, or the government will purchase excess food at subsidized rates and either store it or redistribute to areas in need (often abroad). Limiting food production in an area that produces excess food is good for farmers collectively, but not individually, which is why government intervention may be necessary. If every farmer limits their production, prices remain stable and farmers can increase their profits. However, if a single farmer takes it upon himself to lower production, prices remain unchanged while that farmer has less to sell. In Kenya, where prices are allowed to fluctuate with the market, every farmer has an incentive to maximize their production. This can drive prices so low that farmers must sell food they would like to keep for themselves to businessmen, who hold it until a food shortage (here or in a neighboring country) allows them to sell it at a neat profit. Why can't Rift Valley farmers simply sell their food to the government to redistribute to Northern Kenya instead of these businessmen? I asked several people this question, and they said that corrupt ties between the government and businessmen leads to the government purchasing emergency food from the businessmen at above-market prices.
  Hopefully that answers everyone questions, if you have more please send them my way.